“Welcome to the Hubert residence!”
Contrary to what Leo expected Jack wasn’t the person who rushed in next and neither was Alice nor Claude. It was a young woman who looked around the age of thirty. She wasn’t the country toppling beauty like Anna and didn’t have the curves of Izel, but she did possess a strange, magnetic allure. It was to the extent Leo barely hid the involuntary gulp and managed to hide the stare with a polite greeting bow. Musa didn’t have it that bad, but even his heart rate sped up seeing the lady walk in.
“You must be Leo, right?” She immediately guessed correctly, “I’m Alice’s mom, Henrietta. She had told quite a few nice things about you. Glad I can finally meet you in person!”
Leo knew Alice was a year or two older than him and was shocked her mom could be so young, but the next moment felt like slapping himself. They were in one of the most famous clans of the Golden city! This woman was at least at the Nascent soul stage, maybe even a true immortal! She might even be thousand years old, maybe even ten or twenty thousand! No wonder he could see her with his eyes, but not feel her presence whatsoever.
“Hello.” After the realization Leo did his best to avoid looking in her eyes. The rule number one was still the rule number one and he had no idea what might set this lady off, “You have a really nice home, ma’am. Sorry we came unannounced …”
Just like Kevin, Alice and Claude could have tens if not hundreds of siblings and there was no telling how old their parents were. It was a bit strange to realize a woman also could bring tens and maybe hundreds of children to the world while a man being a father to hundreds seemed natural. Probably it was because his own father had tens of wives, Leo never considered a man could live with only one and have all their children with her.
But, of course, there was no torture in the world that would make him disclose these thoughts to a woman, especially an immortal. There was reason the rule number one existed, thus he shut up and stood there slightly blushed, and fortunately this time him looking ‘modest’ worked in his favor.
“Hahaha! Aren’t you a charmer!” Henrietta seemed to be amused by Leo’s behavior, “Don’t worry, I understand this in not a formal visit and you didn’t expect for us to meet yet … but I was just curious. Henri will be back in two or three days – you should come then. He’ll be as thrilled to meet you as I am. Our little rebel might not be as dumb as she looks ...”
Then she laughed again and left by saying something about ‘youth being impatient these days’ and ‘it’s great to be young’.
“What was all of that about?” Leo asked Musa, while awkwardly scratching his head in confusion, “And who’s Henri?”
His older friend looked back at him in disbelief, “You mean – the patriarch of the Hubert clan?”
“Oh? Claude’s father? Ok.” Leo nonchalantly nodded, “But what did she mean with the ‘formal visit’ part?”
Musa never felt more helpless. The guy could kill a Nascent soul stage expert in a single blow, but couldn’t grasp the basic protocol of coming to his girlfriend’s home to meet her parents and that he should’ve at least brought flowers to her mother. Good thing the patriarch was not there otherwise Leo’s future prospects in the family would’ve been even more bleak. They were already worlds apart in their social standing … and fortunately he didn’t say anything too stupid while she was present.
The butler returned not long after with a short note that he passed to Leo whose eyes lit up the moment he read it.
‘You, damn bastard! What took you so long? My shift is not over for another day, so meet me tomorrow evening at the ‘Rosie’s place’ in the Lantern district by the Eastern teleport hub. It’s not as quiet as the ‘Heart and soul’, but you’ll love it! You can even do immortals there! And they’re f*cking amazing! Guess where the savings of my last half year went!
p.s. Take as many spirit stones with you as you can. You won’t regret it!’
Leo could only sigh with a smile. His old friend had not changed a bit and it was refreshing and nostalgic at the same time. He didn’t know how to bring up the question about visiting a brothel to Claude who returned the moment he read the letter, but they had time till the next evening, so Leo was not in a rush.
They left the Hubert island and flew over to the King’s kitchen. The city looked completely different from the above, although not much smaller. On the contrary – it gave a feeling that only from high up one could properly appreciate the magnificence of it. Immortals and the nascent soul stage cultivators flying by on or alongside their high ranked beasts only added to the grandeur of the place.
Leo was not certain he could find Jamie’s place on his own again. After all, the last time he was here was years ago and he was on foot back then. Obviously, this time finding the directions was not necessary, because Claude gladly assumed the role of the host not only for the Hubert island, but for the city as well, especially since Musa was here for the first time.
You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.
On the way he showed the most notable spots, told the latest news and rumors. Of course, in a place like the Golden city ‘the latest’ was sometimes decades or several hundreds of years old, but it was still fun to listen to. Neither Leo nor Musa had payed attention to the life of aristocrats before and some stories Claude told were akin to drama plays.
When they landed at the Kings kitchen, unsurprisingly there was a long line of gourmets, orderly waiting for their turn to enter the legendary restaurant. The trio quickly found Harold and Kevin who were already somewhere in the middle of the line and joined them.
A while later Fan Yun arrived as well and the six academy students chatted till the sunset when they finally got in. As always, the King’s kitchen was packed, but Harold had pulled some strings and they got a table on the third floor.
This was the first time Leo visited the place so late, but strangely enough the artificial lightning provided by the rune formations made the restaurant seem much more cozy. One lost the sense there were multiple floors and for each guest their table felt to be the only one in the restaurant, until they directly stared at the neighboring one, of course.
When the waiter came, Leo did ask him if Jamie was in, but seeing the guy’s expression harden, payed him a spirit stone to pass his regards to the chef. All the present knew Leo regarded Jamie as his mentor, but they were still surprised when the youthful-looking man came out to greet them.
“Long time no see!” Jamie cheerfully greeted.
He did look like he was tired from overworking in the kitchen even though it was probably just a facade since it was impossible for a person beyond the Nascent soul stage to actually get tired from basically anything including cooking.
“What did you bring this time?” He continued, “I’m sure you’ve been around and brought something exotic.”
“Sorry.” Leo was forced to apologize, “Last couple of years I’ve been busy and haven’t really traveled much to the other realms. We’ve just been fighting the beast tides with the guys and cultivating … my life has been rather dull ...”
The rest, including Jamie, looked at him baffled, but dismissed it right away. Their youngest friend was a weirdo and probably only he could consider fighting against beast tides for years ‘dull’.
“Don’t worry about it! I’m not expecting you to bring over a dragon every time.” Jamie patted Leo on the shoulder and turned to leave, “But I have and idea. Get ready for something special, my friends!”
“A dragon?” Musa asked, furrowing his brows.
These were mythical creatures even in immortal realms where beasts were capable of forming their nascent souls or on rare occasions becoming immortals.
“It was a tasty one …” Claude remembered, but Leo interrupted him.
“It wasn’t really a ‘dragon’. The locals in the mortal realm called it that. It was just a snake, you know.”
“Still, it wasn’t half bad for a thousand year old snake.” Kevin said, “But I wonder what surprise Jamie’s preparing.”
They chatted for a while, reminiscing of Leo’s previous visit to the Golden city and, of course, teased him for waking up in the infirmary until waiter brought over their meals and all dug right in … all except for Leo.
After hearing waiter announcing the name of a dish, ‘Blackwing hawk’s drumsticks in almond sauce’ he simply couldn’t look at the plate in front of him. For the first time in his life Leo felt revolted at the sight of the cooked meat even though it looked and smelled luscious.
It didn’t take long for him to guess that the reason was the ‘hawk’ part of the dish and if it was the meat of any other beast, he definitely would’ve gobbled it down without batting an eye. He did try to persuade himself that it was only another chicken, but no matter how many times he attempted to self hypnotize, he only got nausea. In the end the best Leo could manage was to slowly chew on the pieces of vegetables that served as a garnish, trying to think of a way out.
For now the others were busy with their own food since, as always, any meal at the King’s kitchen was the best a person would have in their lives. Inevitably though they would be done and notice Leo stupidly sitting there at the full plate … and then they would ask what was wrong and whether there was something wrong with the food … and then the waiter would rush over … and then Jamie also would …
‘Damn! This is embarrassing!’ Leo thought to himself, but the only thing he could do was to pray something would happen that allowed him to quickly hide the meat in the amulet, pretending he had eaten it.
A wonder didn’t happen though. It didn’t take long for Harold to be done and he immediately noticed Leo’s unnatural behavior.
“Anything wrong?” He said the words Leo was afraid to hear the most.
‘Heavens! Please, help!’ Leo prayed to himself instead of answering, ‘I promise, I’ll behave …’
But before he finished his thought, an ear-piercing rumble similar to tearing fabric, except thousand times louder, shook the whole city. Some of the weaker people below the Core formation stage even bled from their ears and lost consciousness, but the stronger cultivators immediately summoned their weapons.
This was not what Leo expected or prayed for, but while everyone rushed outside, he quickly hid the plate with its contents in the amulet and joined the rest of the bunch on the street. He had a passing thought whether he should ask Heavens for something else since they were so accommodating today, but the view above the city everyone was gawking at made him blank out and forget about the earlier.
Instead of a starry sky, huge packs of purple clouds kept gathering in a thick, purple whirlpool that already shot down multiple bolts of lightning one after another. The strangest thing was that the whirlpool was somewhere above the center of the Golden city and it was so huge anyone’s first thought was that several people were trying to achieve immortality at the same time.
“This is bad!” Kevin said in a grave tone.
“No shit!” Harold snorted, but then realized his friend was not talking about the situation above.
Kevin’s face was white as a paper and he held his left palm over his dantian as if protecting it. A regular person might behave so after overeating or while having a food poisoning, but dozens of other youths who dropped on their knees directly on the street clearly indicated it was much more serious. Unfortunately that included Fan Yun who was the weakest of the group.